Made of Steel
by Be'Jammin
Summary: Someone isn't all they seem to be. Nobody knows this, not even them. And when the secret is out, there are those who wish to exploit them.
1. Discovery

Disclaimer: Any and all characters that I have not created belong to their respective owners.  However, there are different variations of some familiar characters.

For the past several weeks, something strange was happening to him.  He was getting faster, he was getting stronger, he was… changing.

"Tatewaki, what is happening to you?" Kuno sighed, looking at his reflection in the mirror.  He did not look forward to the long day ahead.

And that long day was extremely odd, since Kuno wasn't in the mood to  challenge Ranma Saotome, to lost in his own thoughts to muster the will to be beaten.  As it was, he walked around the schoolyard during lunch, to hungry to eat, to thirsty to drink, to tired to sleep.

"Is it just me or is Kuno acting weirder then usual?" Kuno turned around to see who was talking, but all he saw were two girls about ten yards away whispering to each other.

"You need to relax, Tatewaki.  You're starting to hear voiced." Kuno said, putting a hand to his forehead.

But, he didn't stop hearing the voices and other sounds.  Soon, he could hear every voice in the schoolyard, every leaf rustle, ever heart beat.  They got more loud and more clear with each passing second, till all he could decipher was a loud, piercing, and painful drone.

"Stop it!  Please somebody stop it!" Kuno yelled, covering his ears and dropping to his knees.  This act piqued the interest of the other students.

"The noise!  Oh god, the noise!  Can somebody stop the noise!?!" Kuno cried, his eyes pleading.  As the pain increased, Kuno started to realized that the pain would not go away and would not stop.  He had to get away from the noise , the source of his pain.  As quickly as possible.

"Yarrrgh!" Kuno cried out and he… vanished with a loud boom.  Had this happened in any where else, people would be in awe and might be panicking.  But, ever since Ranma arrived, Nerimans were quite used to seemingly impossible phenomena.  Most figured that maybe it was time that Kuno got his due and dropped it, however there was one who was very curious as to what happened.

'How did he do that?' Ranma asked himself, looking at the area that Kuno had occupied not even a minute before.  There was a crater, a small crater, but still a crater.  It's cause was as is something shot straight up with tremendous force, causing the ground underneath to buckle and ripple.

Halfway across the world, in a dark room, a person looks at a monitor.

"His TK field has flared up.  He is ready and it is time.  Perfect." The person whispered to their self, followed by a soft cackle.

Sometime later, Kuno awoke with an aching head and battered body.  He was in his bed, that he did know, how he got there was an entirely different question.

"Was that a dream, or did I fly?" Kuno asked himself, getting out of his bed.  His school uniform was still on, as he didn't change into his more formal kimono and hakama for lunch today.  With a sigh, he headed to the bathroom, casting a glance a nearby wall and cracked his neck.  Kuno blinked when he saw a shimmer pass over the wall and thought that he could see movement.  Approaching the wall, he looked closer, trying to figure out what he was seeing and noticed that with one last ripple, the shimmer disappeared, and, so it seemed, did the wall.

"What is happening to me?  Is this some sort of curse from ancient spirits?  Or, worse yet, I may have offended some pantheon and this is their retribution." Kuno said, closing his eyes.  When he opened them, the wall was there, visible as ever.  Kuno headed to the bathroom, to see if there were any bruises from what happened earlier, his mind still idly pondering on what just occurred.

"Good, nothing to serious." Kuno said, satisfied with his check.  He took one last glance in the mirror and stared in disbelief as he noticed that his eyes started to glow.

"Odd, why do my eyes-" Kuno was cut off as two red beams of heat laced from out of his eyes, reflected off the mirror, and hit him in the chest.

"Zounds!  I barely felt that, but my clothes, they do burn.  Maybe this is not a curse, like I originally thought, but rather, a blessing!" Kuno exclaimed, slamming his fist down onto the granite sink in triumph.  It cracked under the tremendous blow and broke up into several dozen large pieces.

"It seems that I lack the proper control needed to harness these new abilities of mine.  But, who shall I ask?" Kuno mused, walking back into his room.  His dismissed the fact that he was floating several inches off the ground.

After several days of intense thought, Kuno made his decision.  That was why he was sitting in front of the very old proprietor of the Neko-Hanten.

"Now, exactly why are you here?" the extremely aged and wizened woman asked.

"I have heard that you have trained Saotome.  I require… similar training." Kuno said.  It was taking all his will power and every drop of perseverance to keep his powers in check.  This stress caused him to tremble in a very visible fashion.

"Why should I?  Saotome is my son in law.  Also, the training was not just wanted, but needed so that he could defeat a greater opponent." The woman replied.

"Needed?  If you want to see needed, I will show you needed." Kuno said, releasing the little control he had.  His eyes started to glow and a low moaning sound was heard.

"I'd duck if I were you." Kuno said, just before two large beams of light blasted forth from his eyes.  The old woman had dodged, but the chair she sat in, the pillar behind her, the wall behind that were not so lucky.

"Now do you see my problem?" Kuno asked passively, covering his eyes with his arm.


	2. Training

Koh-Lon double checked the boys aura.  Not weak, but not powerful, either.  She then eyed the slightly smoking remains of the wall, chair, and pillar.

'To much heat was released for it to be a chi blast.  It was something else, then.' Koh-Lon thought to herself.

"Well?  Is there anything you can do for me?" The boy, Kuno if she recalled correctly, asked.  She noticed that he seemed more relaxed, as if a weight was lifted off of him.

"Go into the wilderness for several days.  During that time, you will train and meditate.  Also, eat as little as you can.  That will help improve your will power." Koh-Lon said.  The boy nodded and left, leaving Koh-Lon to her thoughts: What she should do with this new knowledge and how will it help her tribe.

A few days later, Kuno entered a clearing with his meager supplies.  Since he trusted the woman's advice, he only took a few vital things with him: a good length of rope, a canteen, a cup, matches, sleeping pad, and two tarps.  He had also visited the extensive library at the Kuno Estate and chose several volumes that he believed would be beneficial: A Treatise on Unarmed Defense, The Noble Art of Fisticuffs, United States Army Combat Training Manual, and Learning to Hear what the Body Says.

"This should be a good start." Kuno said, looking at his campsite with satisfaction.  He had used the tarps to set up a lean-to, made a fire ring, and had gathered some fire wood.  In the process, he had taken off his shirt, boots, and socks, leaving him in just a pair of khakis and a white headband. By the end of the day, he had also set up a 'Training Gauntlet,' several training dummies, and a platform to meditate on.  The next few days were going to be long, hard, and exhaustive.

"The judo throw is performed by jamming your shoulder into the opponents underarm, grabbing their arm, and pulling forward while using your back for extra leverage.  If you are in the correct position, you may follow up with a jab to the solar plexus." Kuno read aloud from the U.S. Army manual.  Some people would be surprised by Kuno's proficiency with the English language, but, how else would he enjoy the works of Shakespeare and his ilk in the way the writers wanted it?

"Seems simple and easy enough to do.  But, with my strength ever increasing, I wonder what would happen if I were to let go before my opponent touches the ground?" Kuno mused, heading to the pile of training dummies.  He had been up since before dawn, using those hours to meditate.  Already it was far more easier to control his 'gifts' then the other day.

"Kii-yaahh!" Kuno screamed as he tossed the dummy over his shoulder and into the sky.  It was quite a sight watching the dummy become a small, black speck against the blue sky.

"Hmm, I may have to watch my strength when using it for now on." Kuno said, following the trajectory of the dummy with his eyes.  He blinked to clear some of the sunlight from his eyes.

"By the Ancients! I now see the dummy, though it be far away!" Kuno exclaimed.  He blinked again and his vision returned to normal.  All this piqued his curiosity even more.

"I wonder, how strong am I?  Is it just the major muscle groups or is it all?" Kuno asked himself and picked up a rock the size of a softball.  Clenching his hand into a fist, he easily crushed it and bits of gravel fell from his hand when he opened it.

"How indeed.  It would not be hasty, I think, to believe that my strength is even though out my body." Kuno commented, flexing his limbs.  He continued to test the limits of his strength and the hand-to-hand combat maneuvers he had studied about until it was late in the evening.

"I believe that I have earned my rest for the day." Kuno said, heading back to his campsite.  His meal was light, water with berries and nuts that he foraged for.  After he was done eating, he meditated for an hour before he retired.  As he drifted to sleep, one thought was on his mind: Whatever was happening to him, he was far from understanding and he would never be the same again.

"While traveling through China, I met a local doctor/mystic.  We became friends rather quickly and agreed that we would trade our wisdom.  I had shown him how to heal the body by tricking the mind and, in return, he gifted me a chart.  He had explained that it showed the major ebb and flow of a person life force, which intersected in several different point.  Curious, I compared it with my own nerve chart and found startling similarities.  After some time, I realized that I could apply this to a new hobby of mine, pugilism.  I had discovered that hitting these 'chi intersections,' as the Chinaman had put it, could cause numerous effects.  For example, hitting the diagramed points in the exact order could cause agonizing pain that only the strongest of will or the most stubborn could stand it.  I had also discovered that the faster the points are hit, the greater the intensity of the pain." Kuno was reading from the Treatise of Unarmed Defense and it was quite interesting.  Written by a physiologist who had taken a liking to boxing and other forms of unarmed combat, it compiled several varying ideas on which form is best and nearly seventy different techniques.

"Now this, this has much possibility." Kuno said, laying the book down.  He had dragged a few boulders out to the clearing, a task that was easier then he had first believed.  After some moments of thought, he had the perfect plan to practice what he had learned.  It took a few moments, but he finally got a heat beam, his thermal vision he came to calling it, to come from his eyes to carve the silhouette of a person into the rock.  He added the points he needed to hit with some soot from last nights fire.

"Now, he did write that the faster the points are hit, the pattern becomes much more effective.  The local creeper does take 45 seconds to burn just two inches, so I now have a timer.  Hmmm, I think  I can mark another boulder for each time I complete the pattern.  It should work." Kuno said, collecting a length of creeper two and a quarter inches long.  He placed the vine between his toes and readied himself.

"Hyaah!" Kuno shouted at he use his thermal vision to light the vine and start to strike the pattern.

Krakkakrakkakrakkakrakka!!!

Krak!

That was the noise that filled the air, as Kuno struck the pattern on the rock and then tallied the completed pattern.  After the flame had reached his toes, he stopped and looked at his handy work.

"Zounds!  Each one of those points must be one inch deep, at the least!" Kuno said, admiring the boulder's pocked surface.  He turned to see the boulder that he used as a tally sheet and was even more shocked.

"How is this possible?  Fast I may be, but, I lack the speed to hit a complete of four punches 300 times in one minute!" Kuno exclaimed.  Feelings of joy, pride, and satisfaction filled him.  He spent the rest of the day practicing the techniques described in the treatise and measuring his speed.  Once again, this lead into the late evening and he ate his small meal, did his meditation, and went to sleep.

"I do sincerely hope that I was correct about my earlier assumptions." Kuno said from a top a tall pine.  He was certain that, just a few weeks ago, he flew home from school.  Jumping out of a tree may trigger his ability to fly.  If not, he figured that he was invulnerable to such a degree that a fall from sixty feet wouldn't hurt him.  Much, anyway.

"Banzai!!!" Kuno shouted as he leaped from the tree.  He didn't know why he shouted what he did, but it was appropriate.  He noticed that the ground was quickly getting closer.

"Fly.  Come on, fly.  Fly.  FLY, DAMMIT, FLY!" Kuno shouted and closed his eyes.  After a few moments, he opened his eyes and stared in disbelief.  The ground was but three inches from him.  Three inches from either making a crater or becoming pink goo.

"Huzzah!" Kuno exclaimed.  He shot up several feet from the joy that he was flying.  It took a few minutes for Kuno to realize how to control his flight, but when he did, he was happier then he ever had been.  He willed himself forward and he went forward, he willed himself backward and he went backwards, and it was the same for the other directions.

"It is like I am truly alive for the first time.  Being able to navigate three dimensions at will is… is… amazing!" Kuno shouted.  He spent the day flying around the forest, testing how his other powers worked in mid-flight.

A few days later in a large city halfway across the planet, a phone rings.

"Hello." The man in the recliner, which was next to the table the phone is on, said into the receiver.

"The Last Son is no longer alone.  The other is in Japan." The voice on the other side replied.  The man knew what this meant.

"Are you sure?" he asked the other end.

"Yes.  You do know what to do?" the voice replied.

"Yeah.  See you in a few days then." The man said and hangs up the phone.

"I think I shall miss this place.  In the week I spent here, I have learned more from myself then any person could teach me in my lifetime.  I have grown stronger then I have first believed to be possible.  Thus, my goal should be accomplished easily.  That sorcerer most foul has little time left." Kuno said, walking down the path that would lead him off the mountain and out of the forest towards his destiny.

A/N:  I just wanted to know, does anyone want this continued?  I really enjoyed writing it and hoped you enjoyed reading it.  And, if you hadn't guessed, this is a fusion with the Superman Mythos, though modified severely.__


	3. Revenge

The Revenge Squad

Loophole

Chemo

Metallo

Shrapnel

Parasite

"You sure hiring those drongos is a good idea?  Yer pop used those chaps a lot and the Justice Battalion always handed them their collective butts." The voice was a thick British accent, dark and gothic.

"Mr. Black, I trust that the Revenge Squad will get the job done.  They're professionals.  What is a child and his friends to five of the most powerful criminals in American history?  Besides, if they fail, you and your Elites can finish what they start." Another voice replied.  There was a sound a lighter igniting.

"Alexis, you ain't yer father.  Alexei would have done this hisself with somethin' this important." Black said, lighting a cigarette.

"But, like you said, I am not my father." Alexis replied, chuckling slightly.

"Was we supposed to do?  Muh fists and metal issa inchin' to lodge 'emselves inta some nice, warm, soft flesh." The man who was known as Shrapnel asked.  He was called such because the belt he wore gave him control over the magnetic forces of scrap metal, which he used to a frightening degree.

"Yeah, so am I.  I can feel all the energy in this place and it's making me hungry!" Parasite added.  Back in the forties, the man was bitten by Andrew Bennet, a vampire, and then tossed into a vat of chemicals.  He was changed, he could absorb energy directly from a person, any form projected against him, or from anything producer of it.

"We here to find the Kryptonian kid.  We find him, we take him back to Luthor, and we get paid."  The voice was hollow and mechanical, thus belonging to Metallo, the leader of the Revenge Squad and the oldest member.  The man who wore the black armor was a veteran of both the Spanish-American War and World War I, making him very old.  Some speculated that there was some sort of life support system built into his armor that kept him alive for so long.  Others said that the armor passed down to different people throughout the years.

"Just as long as I get to try out this new mix I developed and I'm happy." Chemo said.  The madman had discovered a formula he called chemo that, with the proper catalyst, could turn to any liquid substance known to man.  So, of course, he used this discovery to become a criminal.

"Well, what are we waiting for?  Let's make ourselves known and start with the brutality!" The youngest member of the group said.  There was something wrong with Loophole, that was something everyone could agree on.  Now if this was brought on by the broken home he grew up in or the powers that he developed in his late teens, was any ones guess.  And his powers were simple, he could create, what he called, Loopholes.  Inky black holes that could traverse over long distances in an instant.  The others agreed and made there way through the streets of this town, this Nerima.

Just a few blocks a way, Ryouga Hibiki had found Ranma Saotome, challenged him to a fight, and they were well into it.  The power that they displayed was always amazing and seemed to attract a new comer to the town.  Nobody gave the man in the purple hued trenchcoat a second glance.  Not even when he walked right up to Ranma, who had just unleashed a Moko Takabisha, which knocked out the Eternally Lost Boy.

"That was quite a sight.  And I apologize about what I am going to do, but it's business." The man said.  Ranma turned around confused, but before any sound could come out of his mouth, a large hand latched onto his face and almost instantly he could feel his ki leaving him.

The crowd gasped in shock, seeing this man who had attacked Ranma, the lightning that arced up his arm, the look of weakening appearing on Ranmas face.  For several people this was to much for them to handle.

"You let go of Airen!" Shampoo cried out as she leapt at the man, only to be blasted by a spray of large pieces of metal.  Thankfully, none of them were sharp.

"He ain't yers.  Not no more, anyways.  An' least not when Parasite is t'rew wit 'im." The mans voice was off kilter, with a varying timbre, and was followed by a harsh, hoarse laugh.

And if happened.  Ukyo tried to use her spatula-shuriken, but a blast of some type of… acid dissolved them.  The psycho that used the blast then started to attack her and Akane.  Mousse tried to help Shampoo, but the giddy kid in orange stopped him using some sort of magic.  And nobody noticed the brooding figure in dark armor that was admiring the battle.

"Metallo, you never cease to sicken me." The voice was familiar to Metallo, one he hadn't heard in a long time.

"Harper.  Now why are you here?  Last I heard, you were dead." Metallo said, turning around, only to get hit by the shield the Guardian carried.

"Well, you know what Mark Twain said, right?" the Guardian sighed, he was bantering.  Something he hadn't done since the fifties.  Metallo got up and shook what daze he could from his head.

"You should've stayed dead, Guardian.  You're no match for me, let alone the Revenge Squad." Metallo said, charging the blue and gold wearing hero.  As this fight was happening on a rooftop and the street fight was going down, one Tatewaki Kuno finally made his way into the town, and would be faced by a decision that only he could make.

A/N: I know this seemed a little quick, but the next chapter will conclude the fight and there will be… cheap humor as well.  Hope you look forward to it.


	4. Battle

"You know what Harper, you're out of your element.  This ain't the Suicide Slum in Metropolis!" Metallo said, tossing the blue and gold clad Guardian, who landed hard and slid to near the edge of the roof.

"New servos?" the Guardian asked, sucking in a breath.

"Among other things." Metallo said, charging the fallen hero.  Right as the armored villain was almost on top of him, the Guardian kicked up his legs, which impacted nicely against Metallo's chest and brought them forward, flipping the maniac off the roof.

On the street below, the battle still dragged on, with no clear winner.  The Neriman's were holding up against the Revenge Squad, but the criminals always seemed to have the upper hand.  The brawl paused only when the black armored Metallo crashed into the middle of the street.

"Hey, who gots th' drop on da boss?" Shrapnel said, momentarily distracted.  This allowed Shampoo to get in a good hit with her bonborri, but it seemed to have very little effect on Shrapnel.

Jim Harper kept a mental list of things he did not like to do.  Jumping off the top of a five story building wasn't near the top, but it did make the list.  As it was, he tried to look graceful, his arms stretch out over his head and his feet together. Luckily, Metallo helped to brake his fall when the Guardian landed squarely on the villains chest.

"Oh Hero!  Was bettuh, catchin' th' villains or savin' th' civilians?" Shrapnel asked the Guardian as he targeted a group of bystanders, a group that included one Nabiki Tendo.

"Boom, boom, boom. Boom!" Shrapnel said as he let out a blast of razor sharp scrap metal.  Now, the Guardian wasn't as fast as those boys that worked out of the Twin Cities of Keystone and Central, but with his training and conditioning, he should be able to close that distance he needed to in time.

As the bits of metal impacted against his shield, Jim made a mental note to start doing more windsprints, he almost didn't make it.

"Shrapnel, go take a long walk offa short pier!" the Guardian quipped as he pressed a button on his shields grip.  An energy beam blasted from the badge shaped shield and hurled Shrapnel several feet from where he was standing.

The Guardian looked around, his senses on overdrive.  He was strong and he was fast, but he was only one man and the Revenge Squad still out numbered him.

"Yo, Parasite!  You ready for seconds?" the Guardian yelled, charging the energy vampire.  Apparently, he wanted to keep the kid that was sprawled at his feet to feed off him again, and the Guardian was not going to let that happen.

Parasite was caught off guard and couldn't dodge the attacks.  The echoing in his ears from every hit he took from the Guardian's shield almost prevented Parasite from hearing the hero's words.  Almost.

"Yeah, that's right!  I'm a soup that eats like a meal!  You'll be spittin' up teeth for month, now that I'm threw with you." The Guardian said, finishing with an uppercut from his shield.  Satisfied that Parasite was in a good enough daze, he went and got the kid.

Ranma could feel his strength return to him.  It was slow coming, but he could wait.  He got a good look at who ever got him a way from that… that… purple wearing freak.  It was a large man dressed in a pair of blue tights that had a cowl, gold shorts, gold boots, a gold helmet, and carried a shield.  They both dived behind a wall, which Ranma rested against, still drained from Parasite.

"Kid, duck" the Guardian told Ranma, already pulling back his fist.  Ranma did so and the man punched through a solid foot of concrete, hitting Loophole, who was on the other side of the wall.

"I… am getting… to old… for this." The Guardian said between pants.  He had tossed a five hundred pound whacko off the top of a building, outraced a blast of metal, beat up a vampire, and now he punched through a concrete wall!  Maybe he should've retired when he got out of Limbo.  He leaned against the wall, thinking that it was sufficient cover, when two large black, armored hands broke through the wall and grabbed him from behind.

"Crap!" the Guardian said as Metallo lifted the hero over his head.  His intent was easy to decipher.

"This was your last fight Harper.  None of the kings horses and none of the kings men will be able to put you back together when I'm through with you!" Metallo said, ready to slam the Guardian's back onto his knee.  But, as he did so, a blur hit him in the side.  His sensors couldn't detect it because of the speed it was moving at.  This something was definitely faster then a speeding bullet!

"T'would seem that help would be greatly received if it were to be offered." Kuno said, offering his hand.  The Guardian took it and hoisted himself up off the ground.  The five recovering villains looked at the two.

"Da Guardian and da Kryptonian?  I din't sign up for this!" Shrapnel exclaimed.  Chemo nodded.

"Yeah, if I wanted to get beaten up into a bloody pulp, I'll start robbing liquor stores in Hub City again!" Chemo said, also not wanting to continue this fight.

"I agree.  Revenge Squad!  Retreat!" Metallo shouted, signaling to Loophole to create one of his inky black portals that the supervillains disappeared into.

  
A/N Someone has pointed out that Kuno seems to be turning into Superman.  Well, I say nay.  No, he's not becoming Superman, though it does have a Super in the title.  As for any good coming out of this?  That's why there's the Guardian.  This version should be able to keep Kuno in check, even with his Kryptonian physiology.


End file.
